American Family Voices was founded in 2000 to be a strong voice for middle class and working class families on economic, health care, and consumer issues. Since our founding, we have educated the public and pushed for legislation on a number of vital issues to make American families more secure, including:

• Ensuring fairness in our nation’s tax code by pushing to close loopholes that allow for corporate offshore tax havens and accounting recklessness.
• Calling on Congress to do more when it comes to product safety, particular dangerous toys and other imported goods from foreign countries.
• Health care, including prescription drug coverage for seniors and an HMO Bill of Rights, as well as expansion of the S-CHIP program for low income families in need of health care for their kids.
• The environment, especially energy issues pertaining to foreign oil and the price of consumer gas.
• The Enron scandal and the questions it raised about the power of big business, and the lack of government oversight for corrupt business practices.
• Retirement issues, including stopping cuts in, and privatization of, Social Security, as well as protecting pensions and retirement savings.
• Advocating a sensible foreign policy and a reasonable approach to threatening nations like Iran.

American Family Voices serves as an umbrella group that helps fund a broad network of organizations – including civil rights, environmental, women’s rights, consumer advocacy and health care organizations, and multi-issue think tanks – and build their infrastructure, both in the field and in communications.

We also fill gaps in the progressive movement by conducting research and providing strategic messaging and public relations work that nobody is doing, which helps to drive new media stories.

In all of these cases, we have fed our findings and research to reporters and bloggers, delivered daily internet feeds to activists, progressive groups and the general public, and in some cases we have run quick-hitting ads to get more attention to the story. We have also run a robust phone calling program in an effort to educate voters on important issues and to help fuel grassroots organizing and lobbying at all levels of government.